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Product Description
This unconventional and lighthearted introduction to the ideas of the major Western philosophers examines The Simpsons — TV’s favorite animated family. The authors look beyond the jokes, the crudeness, the attacks on society — and see a clever display of irony, social criticism, and philosophical thought. The writers begin with an examination of the characters. Does Homer actually display Aristotle’s virtues of character? In what way does Bart exemplify American pragmatism? The book also examines the ethics and themes of the show, and concludes with discussions of how the series reflects the work of Aristotle, Marx, Camus, Sartre, and other thinkers.
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No doubt Aristotle just rolled over in his grave. An essay called "Homer and Aristotle" would appear to be a treatise on two ancient Greek thinkers; in this case, it's a depiction of Homer Simpson's Aristotelian virtues. Raja Halwani's "Homeric" essay is amusing, though, and moreover, it actually ends up being enlightening, especially for those just learning Aristotle's ethics. Bart may be a Nietzschean without knowing it; Mr. Burns is a cipher for unhappiness (except when he eats "so-called iced-cream"); and Ned Flanders raises questions about neighborly love. The Simpsons and Philosophy has a lot to say about The Simpsons, and even more to say about philosophy. The book collects 18 essays into an unpretentious, tongue-in-cheek, and surprisingly intelligent look at philosophy through the lens of Matt Groening's vaunted animated series. The editors are quick to point out that they don't think The Simpsons "is the equivalent of history's best works of literature ... but it nevertheless is just deep enough, and certainly funny enough, to warrant serious attention." The writers of the book are mostly professional philosophers, and they are appropriately erudite. But what is truly astonishing, even for a confessed Simpsons addict, is their breadth of Simpsons knowledge, spanning all 12 seasons of the show's history. The Simpsons and Philosophy is obviously not intended to be a turning point in modern thought, but it is an excellent introduction to some core elements of philosophy. --Eric de Place
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Average Customer Review:
0 of 0 people found the following review helpful:
 I only skimmed this book a little but...., 2008-05-29
To put it simply, this book takes all the amusing situations in Simpsons episodes and SUCKS the funny right out of it to make a "philosophical" point.
2 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
Terrible ... save your money, 2007-07-28
After all the good reviews, including from Publisher's Weekly, I was expecting a thought-provoking and interesting read. Instead, "The Simpsons and Philosophy" is an uneven, but mostly poor, collection of essays that do not do the television show or the Popular Culture and Philosophy book series justice. Some of the more bizarre entries:
In the essay "Thus Spake Bart: On Nietzsche and the Virtues of Being Bad," the author spends many pages describing the Nietzchean hero only to conclude at the end that Bart does NOT represent the Nietzchean ideal since he is merely defined in opposition to authority. For a book about the Simpsons, it would have made more sense to spend a couple of pages explaining what Bart is not, and the majority of the essay explaining what he philosophically DOES represent.
The essays on allusions and parodies are what one would expect to find in a basic literary commentary, not a philosophy book.
"Simpsonian Sexual Politics" makes several claims that I, as a feminist, found astonishingly off-base. The authors' believe that Marge is merely the descendant of many domesticated sitcom mothers, completely missing how that representation is used to undercut and subvert that traditional image. Among their claims is that the Simpson home is a bastion of "moral serenity" except when challenged by the public moral decay of Springfield -- to anyone familiar with the character of Homer Simpson and his antics (lying, cheating, hypocrisy, etc.) that claim is utterly laughable. The authors also describe Marge as "asexual" though they admit she has a "satisfying sex life" -- one can only assume that since Homer's and Marge's active and imaginative sex life is one of the shows' ongoing jokes, that the authors describe her as asexual because her sexual assets are not on display for general consumption. A curious contradiction in a feminist essay.
Having read and thoroughly enjoyed the Buffy The Vampire Slayer book in the same series, I expected the same caliber of analysis for The Simpsons but was sadly disappointed. Ironically, one of the essays in this book refers to Buffy with the shockingly false claim (typical of this book in general) that BTVS is "strongly committed to a black and white distinction between right and wrong as only teenagers can be." In fact that show is well-known for dealing with moral ambiguity -- and the far superior Buffy and Philosophy book has the insightful and edifying essays that this book fails to provide. In the future, I'll be far more cautious about spending money on books in this series!
1 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
 Great for lovers of both the Simpsons and philosophy!!, 2007-06-08
I am a huge fan of the Simpsons but found this book to be slightly boring and some chapters read more like a text book for a college class. I LOVED the book "The Gospel According to the Simpsons" which I read straight through without putting down. I guess religion just interests me more (hence why I gave this book only three stars). If you love the Simpsons, philosophy, and can follow what the authors are talking about you will love this book.
12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:
A Brainwave On Cable T.V., 2007-03-03
It's been said by many great men that everything everywhere has the capacity to teach us something. Even fools can be instructive. We may not like the teacher, but that doesn't devalue the lesson.
Well, The Simpsons is a teacher that virtually anyone could love. One of America's most subversive and enduring shows, it has long been recognized that The Simpsons is much more than a child's playground of primary colors. This is a show that marries incisive wit with low-brow sight gags, obscure cultural allusions with puerile puns. It's a mine of meaning, dressed in a Just A Cartoon coat.
"The Simpsons and Philosophy" takes the extended exploits of Homer and company (up to the 12th season) and digs out as many nuggets of intellectual gold as there are to find, and it turns out there are a lot. Maggie's silence, Bart's bad-boy-ness, sexual politics, hyper-irony, the nuclear family, and what little Aristotealian virtues (if any) there are to be found in Homer himself: they all spark insightful and shrewd debate.
The book, however, should've been called "Philosophy and The Simpsons." There are a few essays where the show is the foreground of the philosophical thought that is dissected and analyzed (such as Irwin and Lombardo's brief treatise on allusions, or Wallace's Marxist evaluation of the show's almost unclassifiable sense of humor), but most of the essays treat the show as a source of convenient syllogisms to help bolster ideas that seem almost beside the point (among these, most acutely, is Jolley's closing essay on the nature of thought -- a dry, thoroughly technical affair that has almost nothing to do whatsoever with Groening's funny, yellow family).
Because this is philosophy (and philosophers) we're talking about, don't expect the sort of amusement to be found in a half-hour block of the Fox television show. It might even be worth pointing out that "a-muse," defined by its roots, means "un-thinking." Although The Simpsons has the versatility to appeal to a broad spectrum of brainiacs and boobs (although not in equal measure, I'd argue), this is certainly a thinking person's book, and to those with patience, an appetite for profundity, and the understanding that wisdom can even come from fools like Homer, well, it's bound to inspire thought of your own.
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
Mmmmmm.......Philosophy, 2006-09-20
The Simpsons have endured as one of the most popular TV families in the world, despite some of the most vociferous criticisms that you could level at a programme. As much as some hate it, there are those love it to the same degree. Finally, a bunch of philosophers have taken "The Simpsons" seriously enough to write a book about it.
The 18 essays contained in "The Simpsons and Philosophy" cover a broad range of topics. Everything from Kant, Aristotle, Neitzsche to semiotics, (I didn't even know what that was until this book!), get mentioned. Although a couple of essays deal with the same philosophical bent, (Aristotle pops up a couple of times), there isn't the overload that has appeared in other volumes in this series, (such as Plato's cave in "The Matrix and Philosophy").
I am no great fan of the Simpsons, but I do rather enjoy the quirky humour. However, even for the non-fan, this book really highlights the complexity of the Simpsons and what the programme has to say, (or not say, as the case may be). In a programme that could be easily dismissed as innane, there is a suprising smorgasboard of philoshical ideas that would keep even Homer in the middle of a feeding frenzy happy.
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